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NOVEMBER 2012 - VOL. 28 NO. 11
by John Coté, San Francisco Chronicle
Staff Writer, September 19, 2012
San Francisco took a major step toward
public power Tuesday when the Board of
Supervisors gave initial approval to a five-year
contract with Shell Energy North America
to provide 100 percent renewable power to
San Franciscans willing to pay a premium.
The 8-3 vote provided a veto-proof majority
for a program that will effectively break
Pacific Gas and Electric Co.'s decades-old
monopoly on the consumer power market
in its headquarter city. It also lays the
groundwork for city-owned renewable
power production.
"The long-term goal is to really do our
own generation," said Ed Harrington,
the outgoing general manager of the San
Francisco Public Utilities Commission, who
delayed his retirement to see the proposal
brought before legislators.
The plan comes eight years after the city
began setting up a community choice
aggregation program, which allows
municipalities to choose alternative
electricity providers. Former Supervisor
Tom Ammiano, now an assemblyman,
began pushing for public power,
a touchstone issue for many on the
city's political left, 14 years ago.
"I think we've sent a pretty clear message
that we in San Francisco are an innovative city
and care about our environment and about
consumer choice," a beaming Supervisor
David Campos said after the vote.
The program, CleanPowerSF, is designed
to build a customer base and revenue stream
to allow for future borrowing to build
city-owned renewable power generation
facilities while advancing San Francisco's
aggressive greenhouse-gas reduction goals.
San Francisco public power plan given tentative OK
Under the legislation, which still requires
a second vote to land on Mayor Ed Lee's desk,
$19.5 million in public funds will be allocated
to secure a contract with Shell to provide
renewable power to San Franciscans. Some
$6 million from that total will go to studying
local power-generation options and funding
solar and energy efficiency programs.
Roughly half of the city's 375,000 residential
power customers would be automatically
enrolled in the program to receive renewable
power. Those customers would be chosen
based on market research the city has
already conducted showing support in
various neighborhoods for paying extra
for power generated through renewable
sources, officials said.
Customers automatically enrolled would
have at least five months to opt out of the
program at no charge. After that, they could
be charged a small fee, about $5, to leave.
Other residential and commercial
customers could opt in. The plan is
to have 90,000 customers participating
to make the program viable.
The city's public utilities commission projects
utility bills will increase by anywhere from
$9.55 to $77.86 a month depending on
customers' usage, with the average increase
for residential customers being $18.53.
According to the commission, about
43 percent of residential customers fall
into the lowest pricing tier, with current
monthly bills of about $40 and an expected
increase of less than $10 if they stay in the
renewable energy program.
Lee and others are concerned that people who
don't want to pay a premium for green power
must actively opt out if they are enrolled.
Supervisor Mark Farrell, who joined colleagues
Carmen Chu and Sean Elsbernd voting against
the proposal, said opt-out was "the wrong way
to legislate."
"It smells of coercion," Farrell said. The opt-out
provision is dictated by state law.
PG&E, which spent $46 million in 2010 on
the unsuccessful statewide Proposition 16,
which would have limited the ability of
local governments to create programs like
San Francisco's, didn't publicly oppose
the legislation.
Allies, though, like the International
Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, were
firmly against it, saying that it would drive
money out of state and inflate utility bills
by an unknown amount. Some city officials
described a vigorous opposition effort by
PG&E surrogates or allies in recent days.
"I didn't realize how big a deal it was until I
realized how hard they were trying to kill it,"
Campos said after the vote.
The mayor's concerns remain, his spokeswoman,
Christine Falvey, said after the vote.
"He thinks we can do better," Falvey said.
Overhead power lines fill the sky
along Quintara Street in the Sunset
neighborhood in San Francisco, CA
on Saturday, September 15, 2012. Photo:
Michael Macor, The Chronicle /SF

NOVEMBER 2012 - VOL. 28 NO. 11
by John Coté, San Francisco Chronicle
Staff Writer, September 19, 2012
San Francisco took a major step toward
public power Tuesday when the Board of
Supervisors gave initial approval to a five-year
contract with Shell Energy North America
to provide 100 percent renewable power to
San Franciscans willing to pay a premium.
The 8-3 vote provided a veto-proof majority
for a program that will effectively break
Pacific Gas and Electric Co.'s decades-old
monopoly on the consumer power market
in its headquarter city. It also lays the
groundwork for city-owned renewable
power production.
"The long-term goal is to really do our
own generation," said Ed Harrington,
the outgoing general manager of the San
Francisco Public Utilities Commission, who
delayed his retirement to see the proposal
brought before legislators.
The plan comes eight years after the city
began setting up a community choice
aggregation program, which allows
municipalities to choose alternative
electricity providers. Former Supervisor
Tom Ammiano, now an assemblyman,
began pushing for public power,
a touchstone issue for many on the
city's political left, 14 years ago.
"I think we've sent a pretty clear message
that we in San Francisco are an innovative city
and care about our environment and about
consumer choice," a beaming Supervisor
David Campos said after the vote.
The program, CleanPowerSF, is designed
to build a customer base and revenue stream
to allow for future borrowing to build
city-owned renewable power generation
facilities while advancing San Francisco's
aggressive greenhouse-gas reduction goals.
San Francisco public power plan given tentative OK
Under the legislation, which still requires
a second vote to land on Mayor Ed Lee's desk,
$19.5 million in public funds will be allocated
to secure a contract with Shell to provide
renewable power to San Franciscans. Some
$6 million from that total will go to studying
local power-generation options and funding
solar and energy efficiency programs.
Roughly half of the city's 375,000 residential
power customers would be automatically
enrolled in the program to receive renewable
power. Those customers would be chosen
based on market research the city has
already conducted showing support in
various neighborhoods for paying extra
for power generated through renewable
sources, officials said.
Customers automatically enrolled would
have at least five months to opt out of the
program at no charge. After that, they could
be charged a small fee, about $5, to leave.
Other residential and commercial
customers could opt in. The plan is
to have 90,000 customers participating
to make the program viable.
The city's public utilities commission projects
utility bills will increase by anywhere from
$9.55 to $77.86 a month depending on
customers' usage, with the average increase
for residential customers being $18.53.
According to the commission, about
43 percent of residential customers fall
into the lowest pricing tier, with current
monthly bills of about $40 and an expected
increase of less than $10 if they stay in the
renewable energy program.
Lee and others are concerned that people who
don't want to pay a premium for green power
must actively opt out if they are enrolled.
Supervisor Mark Farrell, who joined colleagues
Carmen Chu and Sean Elsbernd voting against
the proposal, said opt-out was "the wrong way
to legislate."
"It smells of coercion," Farrell said. The opt-out
provision is dictated by state law.
PG&E, which spent $46 million in 2010 on
the unsuccessful statewide Proposition 16,
which would have limited the ability of
local governments to create programs like
San Francisco's, didn't publicly oppose
the legislation.
Allies, though, like the International
Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, were
firmly against it, saying that it would drive
money out of state and inflate utility bills
by an unknown amount. Some city officials
described a vigorous opposition effort by
PG&E surrogates or allies in recent days.
"I didn't realize how big a deal it was until I
realized how hard they were trying to kill it,"
Campos said after the vote.
The mayor's concerns remain, his spokeswoman,
Christine Falvey, said after the vote.
"He thinks we can do better," Falvey said.
Overhead power lines fill the sky
along Quintara Street in the Sunset
neighborhood in San Francisco, CA
on Saturday, September 15, 2012. Photo:
Michael Macor, The Chronicle /SF